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Sunday, September 27, 2009

Sonoma, California 1853

Sonoma, California, Jul 22 1853, from Thomas J. B. Hubbard, in the heart of the Gold Rush country, to his sister, Julia B. Hubbard, Fulton, Oswego County, New York, blue Columbia, Cal., Jul 29 1853, postmark, postage stamp has been removed. Complains of feeling dull, contrasting "Home" with the "trials and perplexities of a life in California ... Though I can't say that I regret that I came to this country, if it has been connected with something which was not altogether pleasant. Yet man must learn to take the evil with the good & mix them to suit himself ... with one exception California has been more than it ever has been. There has been some commotion since gambling has been stopped than at any previous time. Every night we hear or a murder & some times 3 or 4. This is confined to the Southern mines. A man is not safe traveling for they will take a man's life for 2 shillings any time. I hear [there] was a most brutal murder committed a few nights ago. An old man by the name of Kitsen was killed by a young fellow called Worth from Virginia for something that he had said in regard to Bosonton's assassination. My health is first rate -- never better ... the mill has plenty to eat & enough to which is a glorious thing, for it keeps me out of perotinus. But it is the good imes a coming & I will pick up all the past privations & square the books ... direct [letters to] Sonoma, Tuolumne Co.Cal ... [signed] Thomas J. B. Hubbard ..."